1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an end member to be mounted on the end portion of a cylindrical rotary body incorporated in a process cartridge removably mounted on an image forming apparatus such as a laser printer and a copying machine. The present invention also relates to a rotary body unit including such end member.
2. Description of the Related Art
An image forming apparatus such as a laser printer and a copying machine includes a process cartridge to be removably mounted on the body of the image forming apparatus (which is also hereinafter called “apparatus body”).
A process cartridge is used to form contents to be expressed such as characters and figures and transfer them to a recording medium such as paper. More specifically, the process cartridge includes a photoreceptor drum serving as a cylindrical rotary body for forming therein images to be transferred. The process cartridge includes, besides the photoreceptor drum, other various devices used to form images in the photoreceptor drum. The devices include, for example, a developing roller unit, a charging roller unit and a cleaning device.
In the case of a process cartridge, for maintenance of a currently used process cartridge, another process cartridge of the same type may be mounted onto and removed from the apparatus body; otherwise the currently used process cartridge may be removed from the apparatus body and a new one may be then mounted onto the apparatus body.
Here, the cylindrical rotary body (for example, photoreceptor drum, developing roller, charging roller) to be incorporated in the process cartridge is structured to rotate about its axis on receiving a rotation drive force from the apparatus body. Thus, the process cartridge includes, for example, as disclosed in Japanese Patent No. 3782807, a housing forming its contour, while the cylindrical rotary body is rotatably held within the housing. Accordingly, the cylindrical rotary body includes end members respectively in its two ends, while there is mounted a shaft penetrating through the end members and cylindrical rotary body in the axial direction. And, the two ends of this shaft are arranged across the interior of the housing of the process cartridge.